Pocklington League 2012 - Gala 3

Having swum and won at Wakefield and New Earswick in the first two rounds it was our turn to host the gala and we were keen to claim a victory in our home pool. As ever, our younger swimmers got us off to a great start in the relays, winning 2 of the first 3 races, and that pretty much set the tone for the afternoon! We won 22 events, placed second in 11 events, came third in 9 and fourth in just 3 events! There were 3 disqualifications, 2 of which were relays.

One of the interesting things for me as a coach at Pocklington Leagues is how it means different things for different swimmers. For our National Age Group Championships qualifiers (and those on the cusp of qualifying) the League is great for trying out new strategies - for example Jamie Clarke being brave and sprinting the first 50 of his 100 free, just to see how well he could hold on in the last 50, or Georgia Wright trying to do a couple more fly kicks on her 100 back than she has done in a race before - this is the place to try those things. While for the younger swimmers, the league is often a good introduction to racing 100m events and getting used to pacing their events properly as well as having a chance to watch those National level swimmers go about their business and learn from them.

We now have a long wait for the final round of the league in September when we will pop across town to Askern for the final round, and hopefully round out a perfect season with win number 4.

Final Points on the day were

1st - Armthorpe, 142 points

2nd - Wakefield, 124 points

3rd - Askern Spa, 113 points

4th - New Earswick, 94 points

Current League Standings after 3 of the 5 galas - each team misses one gala during the season.

1st - Armthorpe, 12 points

2nd - Wakefield, 7 points

3rd - Adwick, 6 points(have missed their gala)

4th - Askern Spa, 3 points (have missed their gala)

5th - New Earswick, 2 points (have missed their gala)

Head Coach's Swimmer of the Meet.

Someone who could have picked up the award at every Pocklington League gala this year due to the continual hard work and really high quality race - Caitlin Dixon. Here's Cait's schedule for the day... oh, and she won every race and her 2nd 100 fly was only 0.3 seconds slower that the 1st one!

Event 6 - 50 fly

Event 14 - 100 fly

Event 16 - 100 free

Event 22 - 100 free

Event 40 - 100 fly

Event 46 - 50 free

The only way you are able to swim, recover and swim again like that is to work incredibly hard during training day after day after day. Well done Caitlin